Students at De Montfort University Leicester (DMU) are giving up their Friday nights to help keep a community youth club open in Beaumont Leys.
Volunteers from a range of different courses have chosen to give their time to help entertain and inspire youngsters from the area who go to the social sessions run by Beaumont Lodge Neighbourhood Association.
The club, which started in 2009, used to be run twice weekly but a lack of volunteers has meant that the sessions have been scaled back to once a month.
However, through the university’s community outreach project, DMU Square Mile, the university has offered students the opportunity to volunteer, providing the support needed to keep the club going and giving youngsters a safe place to socialise and have fun in the community.
Kenyan student Chandni Anandpara said she was really excited about volunteering.
The 22-year-old has moved to Leicester for the final year of her Association of Chartered Certified Accountants (ACCA), professional qualification and said she heard about the opportunity to work with Beaumont Lodge at the International Students’ Welcome event.
She said: “I have done some voluntary work in Kenya but this is a first in the UK. This is a different kind of work and I’m really excited to go along and meet the children.”
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Martin Buchanan, Vice Chair of Beaumont Lodge Neighbourhood Association CIO, said that without the support of DMU volunteers, the club would not be running.
He said: “The children love having the students here; they are an inspiration to them. They socialise, they have fun and the children see that students are just like them. They think, ‘I can go to university, too.’
“The Friday night club is really important because it a safe space for kids to come and enjoy their free time. They can socialise, play pool, play on computers, make friends. But this needs supervision, which means volunteers.
“If it wasn’t for DMU and the Square Mile, we wouldn’t be able to do this. With the student volunteers, we can really build a vital community resource and hopefully start running the sessions fortnightly.”
For Halloween, students from DMU helped organised a spooky night of fun at Beaumont Lodge, which Martin said was attended by around 70 people.
Lyric Gough, a second year Media Production student, is also going along to volunteer at the club.
The 19-year-old said she knew volunteering experience would give her an edge when she came to apply for jobs.
She said: “Obviously, it helps on a CV. But it’s also just really fun. I’ve done some volunteering before and I was drawn to working at Beaumont Lodge because I’ll get to do arts and crafts with the children.
“My friends are really impressed with the fact that I volunteered; they’ll hopefully come along in future, too.”
Posted on Friday 18 November 2016